Al-Mayadeen: Hezbollah claims US wants to settle Palestinians in Lebanon

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said on Saturday that the day was “fast approaching” when a US-backed “plot” would aim to keep Palestinian refugees in Lebanon permanently. He said there was a need to work towards joint “Palestinian-Lebanese” resistance, according to Al-Mayadeen and other sites that followed the speech. He was speaking on the occasion of Liberation Day in Lebanon which commemorates the Israeli withdrawal from south Lebanon in 2000.

Nasrallah slammed the US-backed conference in Manama, Bahrain, in which Washington is expected to roll out part of its peace deal. Nasrallah urged Lebanon and the Palestinians to reject the US plans. He claimed the US was involved in a “plot” to destroy the Palestinian “resistance” and called for participation in “Jerusalem Day” next Friday. His speech shows that Hezbollah is closely following US President Donald Trump’s “deal of the century,” which Nasrallah said is a disaster in the making. He called to boycott the Bahrain conference.

According to Hezbollah’s Al-Manar, Nasrallah also praised the Palestinians for their unity in the face of US demands. Even though the Palestinians are actually divided between the leadership in Ramallah and Gaza, both Hamas and Fatah oppose the US “deal of the century.”

The Hezbollah leader, according to Al-Mayadeen, also asserted that part of the US conspiracy might involve giving part of south Lebanon to Israel. He boasted about Hezbollah’s achievements since 2000, when Israel withdrew from south Lebanon.

“Lebanon is no longer the weakest link, but the powerful one,” he noted. But the “enemies of our liberation [of 2000] are now seeking to destroy Hezbollah.” He said Lebanon must preserve its security in the face of threats. He ended by claiming that Lebanon should counter any Israeli attempts to take Lebanese oil and gas resources, a reference to recent efforts to resolve a dispute of maritime boundaries off the coast of Israel and Lebanon.